Posts Tagged ‘winter’

The winter and the harsh austerity measures claimed three more victims in Greece of loan agreements and heating prices the majority cannot afford. A 85-year-old woman was burned to death when a fire broke out in the 25-sqm shanty home she was living in Aspropyrgos. Media report that most probably a spark from a make-shift fire-place set her mattress on fire. she was found burned on her bed. The woman was living on a small pension of 300 euro.

In another incident in Piraeus, the owner of a hotel was burned to death. He was found in a small studio built on the roof of the hotel. The mans was probably used the studio as his home. the fire broke out while the man was sleeping, he died upon his transfer to the hospital.

In Toumpa suburb of Thessaloniki, a woman, 50, was lucky to be absent when a fire broke in the apartment she was living. The fire most probably broke out from a lit candle, as she was living without electricity and on meals from charity soup kitchen.

If we, Greeks, won’t die because of the shortages in health care, the lack of insurance and the high cost of self-participation, we will most probably burned alive or get poisoned from our make-shift stoves and the candles we light to brighten up our nights without electricity.

Falling asleep in front of the fire-place, hulled with several blankets in a icy-cold home, dazed by the lethal fumes of carbon monoxide...

Scared by the many fire incidents since the beginning of the winter 2013, the government plans to stop power cuts to vulnerable groups of the society due to outstanding bills. And here I say, this is not the solution. Then the debts will keep dragging the people to bills they will never be able to pay back.

ΤΗΕ solution is to decrease the prices in electricity with the many extra fees that make power unaffordable, to lower taxes in heating oil, to equal prices of natural gas to those as in the rest in Europe.

PS So happy to be able to inhale again the smog coming from the fire places